is going to be the first question that i ask. >> and mr. president, the talk the after the midterms of the spending reined in on the hill, and any programs that you are seeing? >> well, i am having a cabinet meeting in a little while and we will be asking the secretaries to cut 5% for next year, and last year, first year, i had to do something with the military that was falling apart and depleted and in very bad shape, and that is why we went for two years, and 700 billion, and $716 billion and that took place over a period of two years. we have repurchased and purchased jets, and missiles and rockets, and all forms of military equipment and ships, submarines, and rebuilt and are in the process of rebuilding the military to a level that it has never been before. i had to do that in order to get the 700 and the $716 billion, and those numbers have never been heard of before. i had to give the democrats i call it waste money, and things

that -- iner would have done, because we don't have enough republican votes to do it without them, and when you are looking at the border, and how bad it is, it is because the democrats did not give us the votes and this is why i am hoping to do well in the mid the terms. and all right. i wanted to cut this short, because i wanted to thank you these jobs for great are doing. and we will discuss that more in the meeting. the president discussing a cabinet meeting, and i'm chris jansing and we got this tape a moment ago taking the questions on the disappearance of the washington post journalist jamal khashoggi at the saudi consulate in turkey. today, the police are conducting a search of the saudi general's consul residence in turkey to

try to get more evidence for the investigation, but you heard it, the president is standing by the royal prince and his family for now. and now, joining us is jonathan la mere, and one of the associated press white house reporters who spoke with the president tuesday and ashley parker who is a reporter at the washington post, and also msnbc reporter josh letterman, and let's go to you, peter, what we heard and the president is doing today and this is one of the times that we will hear from him, but he said when he was asked are you giving cover to the saudis, and he said, no, but we did not hear anything about the criticisms that we are hearing from congress, and serious concerns raised from people like lindsey graham and what can you tell us? >> yes, that is right, chris. and jonathan who was in the room yesterday can elaborate on this as the president made the

comparison of the way we were viewing the situation with khashoggi in saudi arabia with brett kavanaugh with here you go again with this idea that you are guilty until proven innocent. and we did hear the president saying about the situation that we of course need saudi arabia here for a variety of reasons in his eyes, and one as it relates to a new deal with iran, and in effect right now trying to crack down on iran, and one of the regional adversaries of the saudi, and the adversary of the united states, but separately, what is significant from the comments here is the fact that he is sort is of holding out. he is going to wait for the end of the week and see what happens, and get more details. he would not say whether they had audio or beyond that and if the fbi is involved and he keeps talking about the $110 billion de deal, and a fact checker is reporting that there is no $110 billion deal right now, and it is not real yet.

at loft the-- a lot of these ar future sales and not locked up but the president is emphasizing his effort to focus on the strength of the argument which is focusing on americans and their ideology. >> and in fact, he just said that a lot of people wanted that deal and we got it, and that is what he said on fox business an hour ago. >> and so you are right, and to be clear again, he said a it is going to benefit 500,000 jobs, and fact-checkers say it is not in the can so to speak, and president obama in the past had also touted potential dealings with saudi arabia and only half of them came to fruition, and a lot of them are far off if they do ultimately come to fruition here. but the president is again the viewing that as his motivation in this more than anything else. >> and peter, i want to go to jonathan that you brought up the fantastic interview that he and the colleagues did at the a.p.

did, and by tying him to the kavanaugh confirmation saying, quo quote, you know, here we go again with, you know, you are guilty up till proven innocent. i don't like that. we just went through that with justice kavanaugh and he was innocent all of the way. so as peter points out, jonathan, he is trying to make an economic argument and distance himself from having any business dealings with the the saudis in spite of the fact that on both of the fronts simply not true. >> right. we asked him yesterday if this investigation would lead him to re-evaluate the united states' relationship with saudi arabia and brought up what lindsey graham brought up, and graham is one of the top allies on a number of issues, and suggested that they are not fit to lead, and rethink how they did it in the united kingdom, and so he has stressed and made mention of the military sales, and did make this stunning comparison from

out of nowhere to justice kavanaugh, and suggesting that it is sort of the culture that we are in right now that you are guilty until proven innocent and it is an unfair burden on saudi arabia. he talked about how he had conversations with the mbs and the king and after conversations with the king that he thee yourized the idea of the rogue killers, and a concept that has not been to the best of our knowledge floated by any u.s. intelligence source, and perhaps not even directly allowed to by the saudis, but something that the president extrapolated from the conversation. >> and being in the room, jonathan, did you take away that the president either didn't have any intel information, that he had not been talking to the members of our intelligence, the u.s. intelligence community that he was just as long as they were forceful denials of the king and the crown prince he had no reason to disbelieve it? >> it is not clear what intelligence he has seen, but you hit on the key point, because his instinct is to give

the benefit of the doubt to these totalitarian leaders and we have seen it with the philippines rodrigo duterte and even to vladimir putin, and others and to side with them, and putin most onotoriously over the russian interference in the elections in 2016 aside from what his intelligence is telling him. the instinct is transactional and the instinct is to put america's tactical interests first and often the economic interests ahead of calling tout human rights violations or in this case what might even be a grisly murder. >> and you also, john, you have incredible reporting on this, and i want to sit up by playing some of what we heard from the former cia director, and the former saudi cia chief john brennan and he knows as much about saudi arabia as anybody about what anybody may know. take a listen. >> i think that it is the challenge for the trump

administration, because i am certain that ci aa has a lot of foirn mace about it and why bin s -- information about it and why bin salman is going to have as strategy. >> and what do we know within that consulate, because there is a big disconnect between what they are saying and at least what we are hearing from the president? >> chris, the turkish officials see the writing on the wall and hear the comments from president trump and what john brennan is alluding to, and they know that the saudis are preparing to come up with a explanation that expuexpu expue prevent blame on the top authorities. and now the deny what has

happened terrible in the consulate, and the fact that they had said that he had left the consulate is not true, and the saw disneed to be held responsible for what was done in their own consulate in turkey. now we have passport scans, and first obtained by the "washington post" and obtained by nbc news that show the bio pages and the photos of seven of the 15 saudis that the turks say are part of the hit team sent to istanbul to kill mr. khashoggi. and we have blurred some of the identities in that, because we have not independently corroborated the identities, but this is how adamant the turks are they know who came into the country, and how it went down and they say they have more evidence as to what took place inside of the consulate and they won't allow the saudis to come up with a false narrative to let them off of the hook, chris. >> and this is personal for you, chris,

chris, and the folks at the "washington post" because he was a colleague of your, and i wonder what is going through your mind when you hear the president being asked about what the united states can and should be doing and if the fbi should be brought in and he says well, he was not an american citizen and seems to joke about what somebody knows or don't know about where this the investigation is going. >> i think that from the standpoint of covering this the as a the investigation that the saudis claim they are waging now is not complete, but as john was saying, this is a president who is incredibly transactional, and this is a president who almost never goes abroad or uses the opportunity to press human rights violations, and if you are looking at what the president is saying that jamal was not a u.s. citizen and inclined to believe the denials of the saudis, because they strongly believe they knew

nothing about it and comparing to justice kavanaugh, you can see that the president is headed in a direction where he is not as forceful on this as i think that just about everyone including the republicans in congress would like to see from this administration. >> and so in the midst of this, and this is one of our allies in the incredibly serious situation that is going on. you have ashley, the stunning tweet tuesday that was addressed in the interview and you want to read the excerpt that as president of the united states, it is appropriate to call a woman even one who is making serious allegations and who you are in litigation against to the call her a horseface and the president responds, you know what, you can take it any way you want. i don't know, should we be surprised by that answer or his lack of concern can about what the implications might be for the mid-terms? >> i don't think that we should be surprised by that answer. and it is worth noting, and in doing some reporting that even his own aides and staffers were not surprised.

they said it is not a sanctioned tweet of course, and they did not know the exact timing, but they knew that the president had been privately quite dismissive of stormy daniels for a while, and there was a matter of time before this sentiment is may be leaked into the sentiment view over twitter and another thing worth mentioning is when i asked them, are you trying to clean this up or how alarmed are you and how problematic is it, and the answer is, look, they are exasperated because they wish that he had not seen it, but they don't believe it has any negative implications for him politically and any negative implications for the republicans in the midterms and even one white house official who said that the president's base likes it when he is going after these people. we have seen him go after women's appearance before, and there have been so far, no penalties, and they believe it is going to fire up the republican base. >> and jonathan, i want to go to some other parts of the

discussion specifically on the midterms, and you asked if he would bear some responsibility, and if the republicans were in the house, and he said, no. he says that he won't accept blame if the gop loses the house. tell us about that part of conversation. >> yes, at the associated press we stand by the interview and the transcript is there plain as day. we asked the question and he said, no. he went on the stress correctly how active he has been. and he has been out there barnstorming across the country and morales this week out west on behalf of the house republican and senate candidates and he understands that the slow house may have been slow to understand or at least the president and what a threat to the presidency this is going to be if the democrats capture one or two houses of congress, and right now the republicans are bullish on holding on the senate but less so on the house, and so he is out there work hard and whether or not he is willing to accept any responsibility for

the defeat. he did not want to go near the comparison of barack obama in 2010 when the democrats lost control, he acknowledged they had been shellacked was his word. it is interesting in the part of the interview that we conducted in the oval office and we said to him, if the democrats do take the house, and they have subpoena power and run the investigations, is that something that can come after issues like russia or ocorruption, and try to unearth the tax returns and he or more less said bring it on and he is willing to the fight with them on that battle even if it means investigation after investigation after investigati investigation. >> thank you so much. peter alexander, ashley parker and jonathan lemire and we appreciate all of your reporting so much. the outrage, and jamal khashoggi's disappearance bringing outrage from both sides of the isle.

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he is one of the president's most ardent supporters but senator lindsey graham sounded furious about the apparent murder of jamal khashoggi and talking about tough action against saudi arabia. >> we are going to sanction the hell out of saudi arabia. we deal with bad people all of the time and this is in our face and i feel personally offended and they have nothing but contempt for us, and why would you put a guy like me and the

president in the box after all the president has done for them. this guy has to go. >> and joining us is senator chris van hollen and let us read what we have just heard from mitch mcconnell and you may not have this yet, but i imagine there is no response to the khashoggi's death, but a response won't happen until secretary pompeo comes back and tells the congress that the investigation is credible. what do you make of that? >> well, chris, you will have a strong bipartisan response as indicated by lindsey graham -- >> you are confident of that? >> i am confident that you will have people come together to impose sanctions on the individuals responsible, and that has to include the crown prince if it turns out that he is involve and all of the evidence is suggesting that this could not have happened without him giving the green light, and it is shameful to see the president of the united states be the mouthpiece for the regime. >> and do you think that --

>> yes, this is a guy reside ing in the united states with children going to school in the usa, and he is going to istanbul and is cut up on the orders of the crown prince. we have seen in the pub luck reporting that the intelligence agencies do not believe this could have possibly happened without the approval of higher ups like the crown prince. and so for the president of the united states to be involved in trying to whitewash this is shameful and that is why congress is going to have to step in on a bipartisan basis. >> and president trump has said, look, there can't be a rush to judgment, and i am shure that yu saw what he said to the associated press and he made the comparison to kavanaugh, and this guy is clearly innocent, and now we are rush iing to judgment here, and what do you say? >> well, what i say is look at all of the evidence in this case. it is mounting by the minute. you have the fact that the two saudi aircraft that were at the airport in istanbul were

connected with the company close to the prince, and the individuals that were directly involved, and you know, the turks just released the passport information, and close to the crown prince and some of them part of his security detail. look, there is no way a hit like this in a consulate overseas could take place without him knowing. again, that has been publicly reported that is the assessment of the intelligence agencies, and the president and when putin told him -- >> so is he ignoring the u.s. intelligence when he brings up something like rogue killers? >> look, chris, there is no way that the intelligence agencies of the united states is telling the president of the united states that this is done by rogue killers and not a chance. the president has become the mouthpiece for the saudi regime because the president and jared kushner have put all of their

eggs in the saudi regime basket for all sorts of thingthings, a they cannot stand the idea that the person they embraced ordered a hit on a "washington post" columnist overseas. if the president is not going to do his job, and if he is going to undermine our credibility overseas by being complicit in a cover-up, then the united states congress has to act. >> and i want to play for you what former cia chief john brennan who had been stationed in riyadh said this morning. >> we can't turn to a blind eye to what mbs has done and it is awful that we have turned a eye on so many atrocious wars he has initiate and mbs has become drunk with war, and he is meeting his own crisis. >> and the president again in

the cabinet meeting brought up the arms deal, and $110 billion and 500,000 jobs, and do you think that is what is the main mote va or the the here, or what is going on? >> chris, i can not read the president's mind here. what we know is that there is a currently pending arms request before the senate for precision-guided munitions that would be used in the saudi war against yemen where there are awful human rights abuses, and the congress already put a hold on that arm sale, and ki assure you that the congress will not approve that arm sale going forward. in addition to the the fact that as you know and it is widely reported that the other items on the arms sale list that the president has been talking about have yet to materialize. the saw cudis have been asked f them, and the fact is that the saudis depend on the u.s. weapon

system systems, and they have a lot of them. so it is not easy for them to be switching to the other buyers when we have the parts for a lot of the aircraft and other systems, and we provide the training. so, i know that the president likes to the frame this as if the saudis have all of the leverage over us, an they may have leverage over him with respect to the private financial dealings and we know that the saudiss have helped to boost the revenue in a num bber of the trp hotels here in the united states, but they certainly don't have that kind of leverage over the united states of america. >> and let me ask you this quickly, because we are out of time, but do you believe if the democrats take the house, the american people will learn what the ties are between the trump organization, donald trump and saudi arabia and potentially also the cukushner businesses a well? >> i think it is very important that the public know, because we should not have a president of the united states who has conflicts of interest here, personal, financial conflicts of interest that can interfere in

u.s. foreign policy making. it is outrageous that the united states government is not out there, out front helping to collect the evidence, and i think that at this point, we probably need to have a totally independent investigation, international investigation, and the united states should be leading the call to have it happen so that this is not all swept under the rug at this point. so i think that congress right now -- republicans and democrats alike -- are going to be demanding that we get to the bottom of this and holding everyone accountable, including the crown prince and it is very difficult to see how the united states can go about conducting business as usual can with somebody who has orchestrated a hit on a washington post k columnist, and resident of the united states and has children here. >> senator chris van hollen, always good to talk to you. >> thank you. and what the president is

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just 20 days to the midterms

and president trump launching a full court press to try to keep his party in power, but a mid wave of democrat cannic enthusiasm and the possibility that the republicans could lose the house, president trump tells the a.p., he won't take the blame if his party loses big in november. ef of staff for president clinton, and rick tyler who is former spokesman for newt gingrich and ted cruz. and wouldn't bit great, rick, as somebody who worked for a couple of well known folks in the republican party, and you say, well, if we win it is because of me, and if we lose, it is not. >> and be clear about something, the president ran on the republican ticket, and he won the republican party's nomination and he is head of the party, and if the party loses the house or the senate or both, it is his fault. so it does not matter what he says. >> yeah. and then he just has to put a little b little bit more controversy into the thing -- >> and if he wins, too, he is

going to be getting credit, too, which he will take, yes. >> and yes of course, and then he uses the word horseface which set off twitter yesterday. this is what president graham had to say about the comments about stormy daniels yesterday. >> i don't think that helps to move the ball at all. you have to remember that he has been sued by avenatti and a bunch of people, and so he is -- he knows that he is a street fighter, and he is also the president, and i just don't think that this elevates him, and i don't think that it does anything good for the country. >> and mack, can you imagine the republicans running saying, why, why, why did you have to do that and misogyny is a problem for him, and then interestingly, that we note that today at the white house at the cabinet meeting, you see the president seated between two female members, and something that -- there you can see on the one side is elaine cho and linda

mcmahon and i don't remember that particular arrangement ever before and in your previous job you know how those seats get assigned and is it happenstance that after this controversy he is seated between two women. >> no, i don't believe. so and my best recollection is the secretary of the state and the secretary of the defense or the treasury would occupy those seats. yep. >> and exact ly. >> and whether this is a full cabinet meet og for the partial one, but you make the fair point. i was really right with rick's very thoughtful comments, and then you injected stormy daniels into the midterm and i got a little bit disoriented there -- >> there is so much to talk about. >> and we will find out, and you know, there used to be the old tip o'neill adage that all politics is local, and in this election, all politics are not local, and there is no question that president trump's

presidency looms large both positively and negatively. >> and so let me ask you both quickly, do you think that what is going on, the apparent murder of a "washington post" journalist, and the president standing back from any criticism and does it play in senate races? does it play in the house races, and does it have an impact or no, matt? >> i think that it does. i mean, this is clearly such a tragedy and horrific event. it is is a worldwide event in terms of the coverage, and so i think that, chris, at the end of the day, the presidencies are generally judged by prosperity and peace or se unsettled about things, and of course, that is the kind of president trump's approach to his governing and the way he manages to a affair, and when we is to see how it

plays out, but my sense is somewhat of a factor, and it is not the driving factor, but it is somewhat of a factor. >> would bit a factor, rick? >> i wish it were a greater f factor, but you is to consider the fact that the president of the united states is now speak on behalf of a foreign government to cover-up a murder of a journalist, and he seems, and he has appeared to have invented the cover-up, and the idea that you would take two private jets from riyadh to istanbul, istanbul, and if you were to plan the most imperfect murder this would be it. i mean, there is evidence all over the place, and the president is going to cover for this -- there has to be consequence to this, but my fear is that it won't have tum pact that it should on this election. >> and i wonder about the other thing which is money. "the new york times" did an analysis of this tremendous amount of money coming in, and they say that in 45 of the most competitive house races, 71% of the democrats outraised their republican opponents in 32 of 45

dr districts, and all totaled these races the democrats brought in $154 million, and republicans $108 million. will that make a difference, mack? >> well, it will. money is part of politics. and -- >> does it speak to the enthu enthusiasm since it is small dollar donors -- >> yes, you got ahead of me and made my point, and a part of the real surge on the democratic side is small donations, and that shows a lot of engagement and enthusiasm, but i must stay on my soap box a little bit, but the way we campaign the finances is corrosive, but we are where we are, and the rules are in place, but ono question, it shows some enthusiasm and a tail wind and a modest tail wind at the back of the democrats in the house races, and we will see how it plays out. >> and we will see how the stormy daniels' comments play out including the little bit of the musical chairs, and we

should say that mattis and pompeo are traveling and they would not be seated next to the president. >> is that it? >> and chris, they do have deputies. they have deputies in those departments. >> yes, mack mclarty and rick tyler, thank you, much. we want to know your thoughts of the 2018 midterm elections, and are you excited about the potential change and opinions of the candidates running in your district and if you is something to get off of your chest about the e lkions, share it. and find out what other voters are saying, too. and coming up, disqualified and why the latest head of usa gymnastics stepped down u four days on the job. we will explain why next on "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. on msnbc. i'm alex trebek here to tell you

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balanced nutrition... for strength and energy! whoo-hoo! great-tasting ensure. with nine grams of protein and twenty-six vitamins and minerals. ensure. now up to 30 grams of protein for strength and energy! another leader. mary bono has resigned four days into the job. kate snow has more on the story. this has been a mess from beginning to end. i feel that your heart breaks for the young women who have come out and they just want some solid good leadership and here we are. >> and for the girls now training with the olympic dream right now, and as you said, she steps down four days into the new job after intense criticism from top gymnasts who said that the organization usa gymnastics was not doing enough to change

after the scandal over sexual abuse by former team doctor larry nassar. >> reporter: under the pressure to resign, mary bono issued a dramatic resignation. and she wrote i would have brought to the organization the angst and anger of my own story, a gymnast who witnessed the assault of a coach, and watches the pierce acquiesced in it move ahead while those who didn't move behind and myself, staying silent and perhaps the norm then, but troubling to me to this day and i would have brought a fire in the belly to make sure that nobody who was taken with jim ngymnastics as i at that age should have to choose between abuse and ambition. aly raisman had said that she was involved in the abuse and

covered it up. >> and abusers prey with silence. >> and she said, i am truly sorry for what you experienced in the sport, and my objection to your hiring is not personal, but the stakes are high in our sport right now. and in her statement, she says she refutes any claim of a cover-up, and bono was in a different division of the firm and not involved with usa gymnastics and the embattled ceo took time to take criticism from simone biles who criticized her for posting this photo marking the golf cleats to protest the nike decision to make colin kaepernick the face of their ad drop. and she responded, mouth drop, so it is not like we needed a smarter usa gymnastics leader or

sponsor. >> believe in something if it means sacrificing everything. >> reporter: and bono who apologized for the tweet explaining that her protest was an emotional reaction from that phrase of kaepernick and when she marked her shoes, she was at a tournament for families who lost a member in the armed services, and literally sack sacrificed everything. and so they are saying that they will take action when a change of course is necessary. >> what happens now? >> they need a new leader and they have been through three in the last few year, and tokyo as you know are less than two years away with all of the young girls trying to train right now, and the usoc and the olympic committee called the situation unfortunate and try to help usag find a new leader, but there are lawsuits pending and it could get messy as well. >> unfortunate is a gross

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president trump lashing out on twitter yesterday denying personal ties with saudi arabia saying, quote, for the record, i have no financial interests in saudi arabia or russia for that matter. any suggestion that i have is just more fake news of which there is plenty. is that true? joining me now is phil rucker, the white house bureau chief for washington post and msnbc political analyst, and anne guerin, and both of you, i am very sorry for those of you who worked and knew jamal and in is an incredibly difficult time, but phil, let's talk about the u.s./saudi connection and how the president views it, and how it is going to the play in as you see it into any investigation. >> thank you for the nice words there, chris. in terms of the president's view, trump's view, he thinks that the relationship with saudi arabia is critical from the economic standpoint and from the

geopolitical standpoint. first the economic piece. there is billions of dollars in arms deals, and arm sales from saudi arabia that he would like to maintain and perhaps grow in the future, and then when you are looking at geopolitics, he can see saudi arabia as a counter to iran in the middle east, and potentially as an arab voice of support for any eventually israeli/palestinian peace plan, and so he doesn't want to upset that apple cart so to speak. but clearly, the khashoggi situation is a cause for concern in the administration, and the president is really being tested here to see whether he is going to directly confront the saudis and stand up for the human rights atrocities. >> and he was asked, phil, about the alleged audio tape of the khashoggi killing, and he said, look, it probably does exist, and what can you tell us about

right now. is there conflict within the administration? certainly looked like hearing from senator mcconnell they wait for pompeo to come back and say about the investigation. there's nothing that we have heard that suggests they think sort of what the overall view is of the people we talked to in congress from graham to van hollen this hour. >> well, the details, chris, are gruesome and they're getting worse and worse by the way. turkish authorities confirming some details to various news organizations about what was on that radio recording. as of now i don't believe the u.s. government has the audio recording in the possession and trump said he would like to have the audio recording if it exists and would like to hear it for himself. i suspect this is top of mind for secretary of state pompeo in turkey meeting with turkey officials.

i assume he'll be asking to get that audio recording into u.s. possession. >> it was during, ann, to see pompeo with the crown prince, smiling, they don't say the name jamal khashoggi. >> very much business as usual for the short period of time that cameras saw mike pompeo with the king and the king's son the crown prince in riyadh, that there was never any mention of khashoggi or the reason for this emergency visit during those brief public remarks. and, you know, we wrote about it that they essentially the administration opening themselves up to charges that they are, you know, kind of sweeping it under the rug or giving the saudis the opportunity to sweep it under the rug. on the radio taaudio tape, ther

subject for reporters traveling with mike pompeo today and they asked him on the plane whether he had heard the audio tape, had asked for it, whether he had it and he wouldn't answer any of those questions but that was something that president trump said in the oval office just a short time ago would be pompeo's main priority and something that he the president wanted an answer to. as of now, the sources says the u.s. does not have a copy, has not directly heard these audio tape that is the turks say they have. although the turks have described them in detail to u.s. officials as well as to reporters. >> anne, phillip, thanks to both of you. appreciate it. >> thank you. coming up, o cannabis. massive lines as marijuana is legal in canada today. we'll take you there next on "andrea mitchell reports." and seamless experience

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canada is now the second country to legalize pot for recreational use. what's it mean for their economy and american tourists? nbc's stephanie gosk is in montreal. so, the u.s. is sort of slowly moving in this direction. some of the states. but prime minister trudeau is kind of all in on the marijuana industry, isn't he? >> reporter: yeah. he definitely is. you know, what he's said is that this move takes marijuana out of the hands of kids and the money

out of the hands of criminals and it's allowing people like this to get in line and buy it perfectly legally. i want to give you a sense of the line, chris. you see the flag up there. right? so that's the front of the store and now i'm going to walk you down this line which continues down the street here and down another three blocks this way. the people that are here are in a word committed for sure. and this move could bring $8 billion into the canadian economy and there are a lot of americans looking very, very closely at what happens here in canada. there are nine states where you can smoke marijuana legally in the u.s. 31 states where it can be smoked for medical purposes. and there is a strong push by the industry itself to legalize it in the u.s. and their concern is that they could get cornered out of the market by canadian producers.

>> stephanie gosk online -- well, next to the line. they're laughing. can i just ask you really quickly? the first time i ever did a story on marijuana i was out in california. it was medical marijuana. and the store we went to kind of looked like a high-end tea store. it was so slick. it was clearly something that was a high-end business. this was not like, you know, some of the back alley stuff going on. have you had a chance to check out the inside there? >> reporter: right. >> what's the offering that's got all the people lining up. >> reporter: it's very modern looking. clean lines. computer screens. looks like the screens at an mcdonald's maybe if you go to mcdonald's and order digitally. and then past those screens, you have lots of different options and there are people that walk you through them. there are 200 different strains. they describe them. the ones that make you tired, hungry, whatever it is. and then you choose.

everyone's allowed to buy 30 grams at 1 go. which is not enough to sell but is quite a bit to smoke in one day. and it runs about -- i don't know. probably about $200 or so to buy that amount. not sure if everyone here is buying that much and here most of them willing to wait in line because this is such a historic day. chris? >> stephanie gosk outside the mcdonald's of marijuana -- thank you, my friend. that's going to do it for me. i'm chris jansing in for andrea mitchell. follow the show online. look who's here. stephanie and ali velshi. >> i'm going do go first. >> o canada. >> i'll go first. i appreciate that stephanie -- quite a lot. i don't think everyone buys the maximum amount. no way jose. every person in line is there to buy the maximum amount. >> that place will be sold out. >> i don't think anybody's buying the strain that's the one that intentionally makes you

hungry. when you're looking up the lineup -- >> i was thinking about this. >> the lineup of joy, rest, pain free -- >> hunger -- >> i don't think you go with this one, makes me hungry. >> i'm not generally looking for that in life. >> i need that naturally. >> chris, good to see you. >> good to see you both. >> i'm ali velshi. >> i'm stephanie ruhle. it's october 17th. let's get smarter. >> trump says he won't accept blame if the gop loses house. the ap said they told the reporters face to face last night in the oval office and this morning the president's calling that headline fake news after talking up republican enthusiasm in a separate sitdown. >> i keep hearing about the enthusiasm, the blue wave. i think we have tremendous